So having not extensively read the scrapper rules previously, I sat down with them earlier and was pleasantly surprised. However, for HoER purposes, I'm curious: is it intended that they blow up so much and be so brutal? I mean, I realize the world is a sack of flaming crap and all, but the rules for the head gyroscope talk about RANDOMLY SCOOPING OUT BRAIN MATTER, and I would hope that even post-apocalyptic medical understanding and technology might be a bit further ahead than that with the anatomy and the miniaturization of the bits. While I think the overall rules are fine with Drain and such, maybe a little dialing back on the steampunk clunky and explosive and bad medical technology is in order for HoER use? Or am I being too cuddly here?

shinryu wrote:So having not extensively read the scrapper rules previously, I sat down with them earlier and was pleasantly surprised. However, for HoER purposes, I'm curious: is it intended that they blow up so much and be so brutal? I mean, I realize the world is a sack of flaming crap and all, but the rules for the head gyroscope talk about RANDOMLY SCOOPING OUT BRAIN MATTER, and I would hope that even post-apocalyptic medical understanding and technology might be a bit further ahead than that with the anatomy and the miniaturization of the bits. While I think the overall rules are fine with Drain and such, maybe a little dialing back on the steampunk clunky and explosive and bad medical technology is in order for HoER use? Or am I being too cuddly here?

More specifically: should we be inflicting some of the more nasty penalties for the implants on HoER characters, given that's there's got to have been some improvement in the technology between HoER and 1880? I mean, the equivalent of the Head Gyroscope is probably a tri-laser system the size of your pinky nail by then, not some godawful geargrinding contraption. I mean, give the junkers a little credit. Let alone the random brain removal bit. At least let them pick an effect, maybe? Drain, the implant effects, all that are mostly ok, but there are just a couple things like that in the rules that seem a bit archaic, no?

shinryu wrote:More specifically: should we be inflicting some of the more nasty penalties for the implants on HoER characters, given that's there's got to have been some improvement in the technology between HoER and 1880? I mean, the equivalent of the Head Gyroscope is probably a tri-laser system the size of your pinky nail by then, not some godawful geargrinding contraption. I mean, give the junkers a little credit. Let alone the random brain removal bit. At least let them pick an effect, maybe? Drain, the implant effects, all that are mostly ok, but there are just a couple things like that in the rules that seem a bit archaic, no?

To be blunt, no. As the book states, "The body doc’s bionics look like throwbacks to the 1800s. They’re big and clunky and prone to jamming up just when needed most."

There is no one making a tri-laser system the size of a pinky nail 16 years after the apocalypse. Not even a junker; heck, especially not a junker since they tend to make their devices out of what is thought to be, well, junk.

Really, the whole point is that bionics are only barely available at all because this was the place where they were best at it, and even there, the science has been thrown back to the "dark ages" of augmentation.

Now, the cranial gyroscope may be a bit more advanced because really that could be nothing more than a trapping, but the side-effects of installation, yeah, they'd still be around. After all, the character is likely letting an intern do brain surgery on them. What could go wrong?

That said, as with any roll, if the installer got perhaps multiple raises on the roll, then the GM could adjust the results to account for that. Perhaps each additional raise beyond the first allows rolling an extra d6 and taking the best result.

shinryu wrote:More specifically: should we be inflicting some of the more nasty penalties for the implants on HoER characters, given that's there's got to have been some improvement in the technology between HoER and 1880? I mean, the equivalent of the Head Gyroscope is probably a tri-laser system the size of your pinky nail by then, not some godawful geargrinding contraption. I mean, give the junkers a little credit. Let alone the random brain removal bit. At least let them pick an effect, maybe? Drain, the implant effects, all that are mostly ok, but there are just a couple things like that in the rules that seem a bit archaic, no?

To be blunt, no. As the book states, "The body doc’s bionics look like throwbacks to the 1800s. They’re big and clunky and prone to jamming up just when needed most."

There is no one making a tri-laser system the size of a pinky nail 16 years after the apocalypse. Not even a junker; heck, especially not a junker since they tend to make their devices out of what is thought to be, well, junk.

Really, the whole point is that bionics are only barely available at all because this was the place where they were best at it, and even there, the science has been thrown back to the "dark ages" of augmentation.

Now, the cranial gyroscope may be a bit more advanced because really that could be nothing more than a trapping, but the side-effects of installation, yeah, they'd still be around. After all, the character is likely letting an intern do brain surgery on them. What could go wrong?

That said, as with any roll, if the installer got perhaps multiple raises on the roll, then the GM could adjust the results to account for that. Perhaps each additional raise beyond the first allows rolling an extra d6 and taking the best result.

Ah, I had kind of thought they were the last place with the facilities and know how, but you could still get the prewar bits; didn't realize they were building them wholesale.

That actually could be an interesting Edge/price increase option: if your scrapper can get ahold of genuine prewar medical salvage for implants, maybe it doesn't suck quite so hard for him.